Miep Gies (1909-2010)

Seria nesta altura que eu deveria dizer para quem não saiba/soubesse quem tinha sido esta senhora (na realidade mais uma entre milhões mas que por acaso ficou para a história por ser uma das mais importantes personagens reais de um diário, também ele muito real), para lerem o Diário de Anne Frank. Contudo... Born Hermine Santrouschitz in Vienna, Miep Gies was transported to Leiden from Vienna in December 1920 to escape the food shortages prevailing in Austria after World War I. In 1922, she moved with her foster family to Amsterdam. In 1933, she met Otto Frank when she applied for the post of temporary secretary in his spice company, Opekta. She initially ran the Complaints and Information desk in Opekta, and was eventually promoted to a more general administrative role. She became a close friend of the Frank family, as did Jan Gies, whom she married on July 28, 1941 after she refused to join a Nazi women's association and was threatened with deportation back to Austria. Her knowledge of Dutch and German helped the Frank family assimilate into Dutch society, and she and her husband became regular guests at the Franks' home. With her husband, and her colleagues, Victor Kugler, Johannes Kleiman, and Bep Voskuijl, Miep Gies helped hide Edith and Otto Frank, their daughters Margot and Anne, Hermann and Auguste van Pels, their son Peter, and Fritz Pfeffer in a secret upstairs room that was not used in the spice company's office building on Amsterdam's Prinsengracht from July 1942 to August 4, 1944. In theory, Miep and the other helpers could have been shot if they had been caught hiding Jews. On the morning of August 4, 1944, acting on information provided by an informant, the Gestapo arrested the people hidden at Frank's place of business, as well as Victor Kugler and Johannes Kleiman. A few days later, Miep unsuccessfully tried to bribe the Austrian Nazi officer to release her friends. Three separate criminal investigations after the war all failed to identify the informant. Before the hiding place was emptied by the authorities, Miep retrieved Anne Frank's diaries and saved them in her desk drawer for Anne's return. Once the war was over and it was confirmed that Anne had perished in Bergen-Belsen, Gies gave the collection of papers and notebooks to the sole survivor from the Secret Annexe, Anne's father, Otto. After transcribing sections for his family, his daughter's literary ability became apparent and he arranged for the book's publication in 1947. Miep did not read the diaries before turning them over to him, and later remarked that if she had she would have had to destroy them because Anne had named all five of the helpers (the Gestapo had identified and arrested two) as well as their black market suppliers. She was, however, eventually persuaded by Otto Frank to read it in its second printing.

Retirado daqui, pois claro:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miep_Gies